The Right to Know in the Age of Surveillance

Thought, engagement and the communication of meanings depend upon perception. "Synæsthesia: Communication Across Cultures" is an open-source, refereed journal that acknowledges these varied perceptions and strives to unravel issues of communication practice and contemporary theoretical frameworks. From the subjective-embodied to the objective, interpersonal to mass-marketed, regional to global, academic to corporate, among genders, and across time, Synæsthesia seeks to traverse disciplinary boundaries and advance progressive understanding within and across cultures.

Synæsthesia managing editors Dr. Christopher Melley and Dr. Daniel Broudy are pleased to announce that this special edition of the journal will be co-edited by Dr. Jeffery Klaehn (editor of The Political Economy of Media and Power, 2010).

Synæsthesia invites submissions for a special upcoming edition of the journal (Vol. 2, No. 2) specifically focused on "The Right to Know in the Age of Surveillance" — authors may focus on issues and topics relating to ways in which perceptions or established meanings of 'knowing', 'speaking,' and 'living in a free society' clash or align with conventional wisdom, common practice, and/or institutions of power.

Possible themes/topics to be explored (in no way exhaustive) include:

(a) how are digital communication technologies (such as the Internet) used as political, cultural, economic, military, or hegemonic tools to broaden, maintain, or curb free speech or free inquiry? (b) how are these tools used to embody or express a political, cultural, military, economic, or hegemonic agenda? (c) what are the underlying, un-stated aims of those people or institutions that seek to redefine 'knowing' or 'inquiring' or 'feeling secure in one's right to privacy'? (d) what are the prevailing surveillance practices and their effects on the individual, on society, on perceptions of freedom and privacy? (e) what is significant about the language used by the powerful to enforce these practices? (f) what are some significant unintended effects of limiting or maintaining the right to know, to inquire, to surveil? (g) how is belief in the right to surveil asserted or negotiated socially? (h) in what way does economics reproduce the desire maintain the perceived right to surveil? (i) what are the gendered and racialized consequences of surveillance? (j) how does surveillance work interpersonally, socially, marking those as members of the in-group and those of the out-group?

Submissions lodged by e-mail should include a title, abstract, author's name, and institutional affiliation. Including in the subject line of your e-mail submission the proposed title of your essay/paper will help us parse spam from legitimate inquiries. Manuscripts attached to e-mail submissions should be saved in the MSWord .doc format.